Carrying a five-place grid penalty for his collision with Nick Heidfeld in Germany, Buemi didn’t use the super-soft tyres in qualifying, guaranteeing his elimination in Q1.

From 23rd on the grid Buemi picked off five cars on the run to the first corner. He gained anoher four places over the rest of the lap to hold 14th place as lap two began.

He passed the two Williams drivers in the next two laps to claim 12th. But a late switch to slicks allowed Rubens Barrichello to claim the place back.

Alguersuari had 13th place off him on lap 16 but Buemi continued to move forward, passing Vitaly Petrov.

Unhappy with his car balance, Buemi made his third pit stop on lap 43 which included a front wing adjustment which he quickly felt the benefit of.

He swapped places with Paul di Resta, though the Force India driver came out on top. After the rain shower they found themselves queued up behind Kamui Kobayashi.

Buemi got down the inside of the Sauber on lap 61 to claim eighth place, where he finished.

Buemi said it was “a fantastic race, one of my best.”

“As it began to dry, I felt the set-up was not perfect and I had too much understeer.

I tried not to get upset about it and then the team did a very good job, working at the pit stop to change the wing angle which helped me to save the tyres better and the stop was quick enough for me to jump up a few places.

“When the rain returned, I again felt the car was working very well and I was able to run at a good pace again, which helped me get into the points.”

24 comments on Toro Rosso: Buemi races to eighth from 23rd

A very good performance again my both drivers… they seem to have very quiet races – nothing spectacular but always send to end up very high in the results. This has to be the best season Toro Rosso have had, they are consistently of points scoring potential now.

Not so quiet as it looks like… Buemi passed Petrov and Kobayashi, Alguersuari passed Buemi, Barrichello, Petrov and Kobayashi… Alguersuari was the faster one (after 2nd stop he was running 1,5 – 2 seconds faster then Di Resta ahead of him) and Buemi was the one with less mistakes… After the race Franz Tost and Giorgio Ascanelli were really impressed by Alguersuari s pace saying he drove his best race and the possible 7th place would be well deserved… It is all mentioned on his official website…

These two are having one of the best teammates duel of the year, no doubt.

Funny how they’ve been tagged as being equally mediocre in the recent past, because it’s become obvious over the past few races that if they’re closely matched in anything, that’s excellence. They’re beating Williamses, Saubers and whatnots, in a car that’s disastrous on saturdays and has some very serious flaws on race trim too (i.e. one of the most ineffective DRS systems, I’m quoting Alguersuari but aerial views of Hungary’s main straight made it obvious on sunday).

If Marko and co. are still determined to kick either of these guys out to make way for Ricciardo in 2012, then they have some food for thought over the coming months…

Fight for the midfield clearly heating up. The STR car misses qualifying pace, but the drivers are able to take it places in the race. It could well be that they are just being really good and the car isn’t.

So not only Ricciardo showed promising pace during a phase of a race… After finally overtaking Barrichello, Alguersuari was running only few tenths slower then Vettel, Button, Rosberg and Massa… The times can be found at fia.com… So, it is no surprise that Jaime was hailed after the race from Franz Tost and Giorgio Ascanelli for his incredible pace… Shame about the late rain, which ruined his effort to finish 7th… (at the time he was ahead of both DIR and BUE)